Power Supply ASRock B350 ITX, Ryzen 2200G build completed, kind of. Issues..

[a13antichrist]

Sure, but the market for that is even smaller than for direct plug units in my opinion, so no company would waste their money doing it. Until there is a wide variety of cases that use Flex, and people want quiet Flex PSUs (outside of the SFF niche), we're not getting any.

I don't get your last statement about HDPlex and Mini-box psu being silent. That's part of their inherent design, they are cooled by the natural convection inside SFF cases.

Also, that Chieftec case is a terrible comparison to offer. Only seems to offer a single, low profile expansion slot, and even if there was enough space to fit a double slot low profile 1050ti, it would be right up against the PSU, effectively choking it, to which the only solution is to use a different PSU. Sure, in your situation that case may work because your PC uses an iGPU, but some of us want better performance than that .

Exactly, because that's what I'm willing to sacrifice to go small: performance. Those who want to keep the performance need to sacrifice something else, namely value. But I've already sacrificed performance so I don't get why I should need to sacrifice value -as well-. Like they say, speed, size, value: pick any two. Well, you should at least always get two.

 

[a13antichrist]

All your words are to say that "I do not care for the pioneering efforts of SFF DIYers". Perhaps this is not the forum for you!

Not at all, in fact I would almost say quite the opposite. I came here because I'm fascinated with all the innovative ways people are coming up with to shoehorn powerhouses into small spaces. If anything I'm just disappointed that the only solution to the psu question seems to be, "throw more money at it".

 

[Jello]

You and I have different opinions on value then. I think the more expensive direct plug PSUs offer amazing value, most importantly because they use quality components, and have been thoroughly tested before being sold to consumers. If you look at HDplex and PicoPSU units, the SATA and peripheral cables on neither board would go out toward your ram sticks on the Asrock board, so that's just a bad design from your PSU manufacturer IMO.

What did you pay for the 150W units if you don't mind me asking?

 

[Shahmatt]

Not at all, in fact I would almost say quite the opposite. I came here because I'm fascinated with all the innovative ways people are coming up with to shoehorn powerhouses into small spaces. If anything I'm just disappointed that the only solution to the psu question seems to be, "throw more money at it".

No one has unlimited resources to spend on this stuff, and nobody throws away their money. Your experience on bad goods should prove to you just that.

What is in fact recommended here actually represents excellent value for the Enthusiast. The fact that you seem to not be able to appreciate that suggests to me you are in the wrong place to vent your frustrations.

 

[Phuncz]

A problem I see in this thread is the perception that you should pay what you expect it is worth vs what it costs. Expecting to have passively cooled, densely packed power supplies from a reputable manufacturer being somehow equivalent to a product being sold almost anonimously and unregulated for a lot lower price should not trigger "jackpot !" in your mind but the question: "why is it so much cheaper than all the rest ?".

And when you can't figure out the answer, it's most likely "because it's not the same product". Meaning reliability, performance or specs (voltage ripple for instance) are not what they claim they are. If you don't know why these are important for a computer, you certainly wouldn't want to skimp on them. Being ignorant in SFF building is only going to cost you money.

Especially from AliExpress: sellers don't worry if you try to sue them because your house or hardware burns down because of their low quality component choice and fabrication. There's a huge barrier between them and you meaning they have very little incentive to make genuine promises.

 

[a13antichrist]

Listen, as I've said, I don't mind paying a premium for quality parts, when the increase is proportional and the overall cost is reasonable. Quality ATX PSUs can be had around the $60 mark, talking about say 400W. Like we've been saying, you can have power, cost and size, but pick any two. Well basically with the -GOOD- picos you're losing both power -AND- cost. I really don't mind paying $60 for a 150W Pico instead of $60 for a 400W ATX. That in my mind is the trade-off: less power, same money, smaller size. But to lose both power AND value means that the equation is not justified.

400W ATX @ $60 = $0,15 / W.

In the comparison above, we added roughly 20% to have the same ability in the smaller factor. But:

150W @ $100 (incl AC) = $0,666 / W.

That's a factor of more than 4x increase. Now that to me is what makes the proposition unattractive. If a low-power Core T-series CPU cost 4x the standard S-series, would --anyone-- ever buy it? Very unlikely, we would buy the standard model and undervolt, surely.

I've been looking around for other options. I found a 'Z2-ATX-160' which actually seems to be labelled 'Z1' instead. Are these any good or another knock-off? Does look (capacitor-wise) more like my cheap ones than the mini-box units.

I also saw an 'M3-ATX-160', but upon searching further I couldn't find any actual direct-ATX-style model under that name; The M3-ATX I did find were WI and the peeps are asking $50 for shipping alone. :/

So let me go back to my original question: Is there a way, and if so how, to determine whether a pico unit (and similarly AC-Adapter) is good quality/reliable, other than to simply buy the really expensive ones? I understand "look for big thick capacitors", I'll certainly do that as a start.

 

[jØrd]

Quality ATX PSUs can be had around the $60 mark, talking about say 400W

Their also churned out of mass production factories by the pallet load every day. The people who are currently making high quality pico PSU's are not opperating anywhere near that volume, their costs are substantially higher, this is passed on to you. Perhaps instead of looking at it like its some kind of great rip-off swindle look at it like your supporting small creators who are trying to push the state of the art forwards for all. As I said, they didnt just wake up one day and go "fuck it, lets price out a huge chunk of our market for shits and giggles, seems like a great way to run a fucking business and im totes legit all the business".

Now that to me is what makes the proposition unattractive

Yes, we are all well aware that your unhappy about this.

So let me go back to my original question: Is there a way, and if so how, to determine whether a pico unit (and similarly AC-Adapter)

Yes, spend even more money one very very expensive testing gear and learning to use it or, i dunno, buy from a reputable brand.

$46.50, have at it
http://www.mini-box.com/picoPSU-160-XT

 

[jØrd]

out of curiosity, how much have you spent, including shipping, cumulatively on PSU's up to this point? I dont mean forever, just in this saga. Going from memory you purchased two or three DC-DC boards at around $15 each or something + two or three AC-DC bricks at $20 each or something. At this point your basically in the same cost as one good PSU that will last you build after build after build.

 

[a13antichrist]

Yes, spend even more money one very very expensive testing gear and learning to use it or, i dunno, buy from a reputable brand.

$46.50, have at it
http://www.mini-box.com/picoPSU-160-XT

You know, mini-box.EU redirects to a site 'cartft' (same products so I --assume-- they're official partners) and I almost bought from them in the first place but it annoyed me that their 120W sellls for 34€ while the 150 jumps to 48 and the 160 = 50€

Also, a related question: seems I can buy whole entire cases with 120W pcb-PSUs and included AC adapters for around $70. Quite nice cases actually too. Is there a reason to think that these PSUs wouldn't be sufficient to do the job, ie power a PC demanding 80-100W on a regular basis? Would be cheaper to buy the whole case package and then sell off the shell for a few bucks just to get the PSU/AC.

 

[jØrd]

You know, mini-box.EU redirects to a site 'cartft' (same products so I --assume-- they're official partners)

Thats a dangerous assumption to make, whilst its certainly plausible it would likely be worth firing an email at them to clarify.

there a reason to think that these PSUs wouldn't be sufficient to do the job

As a rule of thumb, and i stress that part, its advisable to avoid included PSU's w/ chassis, they tend to be somewhat marginal. There are certainly exceptions to this rule but they are the exceptions. Consider that the manufacturer still has to make a profit on their case, including a PSU eats into this, including a good one basically eliminates it.

EDIT: http://www.minipc.de/catalog/gl/87
EDIT 2: As per my post above, how much are you in on cheap DC-DC and AC-DC units at this point?

 

[a13antichrist]

out of curiosity, how much have you spent, including shipping, cumulatively on PSU's up to this point? I dont mean forever, just in this saga. Going from memory you purchased two or three DC-DC boards at around $15 each or something + two or three AC-DC bricks at $20 each or something. At this point your basically in the same cost as one good PSU that will last you build after build after build.

Well I'm building 3 PCs at once at the moment, still waiting on the other two cases. They both have 120W units + AC adapters included, but both of the stand-alone PCB variety so I bought a couple extra picos in case I want to do something inside the case (unlikely though). I decided I would rather have the option of trying a few of them out precisely to see whether the cheap ones were a viable option or not. I'm still suspicious that the picos I have are simply not liked by the power delivery standards of the ASRock board; that's a good thing of course, I suspect other boards might be happy to run them anyway, opening the door to potential failure/etc.

If I can find a cheap/old mobo/cpu combo I will try to set these up with those picos and put them under some stress.

But to answer your question, yes the two @14€, and since then I've bought another two 160W for 10€ + 17€, although of different layout because I became curious about the whole question and wanted to see if other, cheap boards showed the same result. Then the three AC-adapters, 1x 16€ & 2x 22€. But as I said, it's for three computers in the long run, so, we're talking around 100€ (incl shipping) total vs 300€ (excl shipping) if I'd bought 3x 150W + AC from minibox in the first place. And as mentioned I will have overflow of some pcb-style dc-boards to resell or kill.

Update, have just bought an old X4-9750 + mobo + ram for 30€ so I'm going to lay that out on a bench and give the whole set of PSUs a whirl. My gf has been asking me to show/teach her the insides of a computer for a little while, heh. If it blows up, no worries

 

[Jello]

Power delivery standards are determined by ATX specifications, not by individual board manufacturers. Even if one of the cheaper units works on a different board, that might not be a good thing, could cause components damage.

 

[a13antichrist]

Power delivery standards are determined by ATX specifications, not by individual board manufacturers. Even if one of the cheaper units works on a different board, that might not be a good thing, could cause components damage.

Yes, but for example one board with 8-phase delivery might decide the ripple detected from one PSU is unacceptable, while a different board might not complain and run it anyway - but as you said, and as I said earlier, opening the door to potential damage. Manufacturers are always free to tighten their tolerances if they think it's in the best interest of their products.

 

[jØrd]

Yes, but for example one board with 8-phase delivery might decide the ripple detected from one PSU is unacceptable

No, ripple tolerance is defined by the ATX spec, not the individual board vendors. If your PSU is in spec then, theoretically, it should be good w/ any board that is also in spec. YMMV though.

 

[a13antichrist]

I see, well, good thing then that I'm now curious to try it/them out on a couple different boards.

 

[a13antichrist]

FYI, the $10 board I bought (from ebay, shipped from China) appears to have the exact same PCB/caps/etc as the Streacom ST-Nano160 (which they include with even their high-end cases), which I've seen selling for £120 incl AC adapter (UK obviously), 90€ here in NL with no AC adapter.

 

[jØrd]

Perhaps it is the same board, just being sold directly from the factory that OEM's it, this does happen.
Perhaps it is the same board but using lower graded or more marginal components, this does happen.
Perhaps it is a knock off board thats been reverse engineered (there isnt much there to reverse engineer) using components of varying quality and grades depending on what the counter fitters can get at any given time, this does happen.
Perhaps it is a board that didnt pass QA to a level where it could be sold to Streacom, this does happen.
Perhaps it is the case that Streacom just buy a cheap and generic part from some Chinese OEM because they dont make sweet fuck all money off including a PSU in the chassis, even the more expensive ones, this does happen.

 

[a13antichrist]

Fabulous, what could go wrong?

 

[bennony]

Hi,

I have long been using a NoName Pico PSU 160w (16 €) with a Leicke 150W power supply (25 €), currently I use it with a
Gigabyte (GA) AB350N Gaming WIFI /
Ryzen5 2400G + Noctua NH-L9a with Wraith Spire RGB /
G.Skill Trident Z RGB F4-3200C14D-16GTZR /
1x Nvme Samsung Evo 960 /
2x Seagate ST4000LM024 /
1x Western Digital WD10JPVX
all in a HFX Micro housing ;-)


Motherboard replacement is imminent on ASRock Fatal1ty AB350 gaming ITX / ac

Nevertheless, the Pico PSU ... even the cheapest can be top with a stable power supply! My little one does not have to hide, runs even after hours of play still stable! All excitement is good, I am very satisfied!

 

[Thehack]

PCB and caps are pretty similar on cheap picos. They're all the same design really. It's a low power IC that controls a couple mosfets to route the 12V and some voltage regulator to do 5v and 3.3v.

I wouldn't trust them to run more than 60W.

There are many corners that are cut compared to the minibox one, even if using the same pcb design.

1. Quality of PCB
2. Quality of caps
3. Quality of SATA and other connectors
4. Smaller diameter wires. Like, too small.
5. Quality of Mosfet. Likely will not be able to handle rated load.
6. Warranty support.
7. Certified to follow EE standards.
8. Quality of soldering.

Also, not sure why you compared any of your Ali units to the 150W minibox one. I know minibox will run at their rating. The cheap Ali ones I would divide the rating by 2. The performance of your cheap ones are comparable to the lowest rated minibox, which is $25, while being inferior in quality.

Now is it generally safe to use? If you know the limits. I wouldn't power a 2200G on a cheap one, but a Pentium, Celeron, or low power version I wouldn't mind.

But don't be surprised if the the connec melts or fries your motherboard.

Finally your trade off is completely incorrect for psu. These are the general 3 trade offs: size, output, and cost. You can have small and cheap but your output will be low. You can have small and powerful but your cost will be high. You can have cheap and high output, but it's going to be big.

Once you apply the proper trade-off maybe it'll make more sense to you. The 160XT is a comparatively high in power, especially for it's size. It can power a 1060 and a T processor. So it is high output, small size, but high cost. Your relative scale is skewed because you're so used to seeing 400W PSU being $30. In comparison, 400W sff is a very high end and costly solution.

In SFF land the relative power is much different. Our low power is APU class. Medium power is 1060 class. High power 1070 class. You're out of your mind and got mad cash is 1080/ti class.

We don't care about the wattage in the same way people building ATX. They often compare 500W to 800W PSU, while a 500W continuous rated PSU can handle a 8600 and a 1080 just fine.

We are much more exact when comparing our power solution. If we are powering a 1070 and i5 we have to select our components that can power exactly that. Excess wattage gets real expensive if you're building stuff smaller than SFX PSU.